LeROY - Students at LeRoy Elementary School will return to a safer, more comfortable environment when school starts later this month.

The LeRoy school board approved the sale of life-safety bonds for projects that added a $1 million geothermal unit and new wiring at the grade school.

With the new system, each of the 33 classrooms, office, library, science lab, cafetorium and gym will have its own unit with heat pump and thermostat.

Under the old system there was no way to regulate the temperature in the individual rooms, which meant some rooms were too hot or too cool, depending on which direction the windows faced.

Property Services Director Ed Underhill said the system works by pumping antifreeze through the wells and into pipes buried below ground. The geothermal field, which is located on the east side of the building, consists of 67 wells buried 300 feet deep. At that depth, the temperature stays at least 52 degrees, Underhill said.

Underhill said it is the same type of system used in the Unit 5 and Heyworth school districts.

The system should pay for itself in 15 or 20 years, said Underhill. Heyworth installed a system last year. Previously, classrooms were cooled by individual air conditioners, which had been the case at LeRoy.

"In the first three months, Heyworth saved $3,000 per month on its electric bill and the classes were all air conditioned," Underhill said.

Changes have also been made in the wiring and lighting of the building additions built in 1950 and 1964. There were not enough outlets and circuits in those classroom wings to allow for today's technology.

The electrical work cost an additional $76,000.